Adwords needs new Display URL guidelines

[johannes]

For one query there can be several ads that leads to the same landing page. An example could be this:

Query:widgets
Display Url => Landing page URL
www.widgets.com => www.widgets.com
www.midgets.com => www.widgets.com
www.widgets.ca => www.widgets.com
www.widget.com => www.widgets.com

I have these objections
1. There seems to be no restrictions for the display url. Put in anything you want. Sometimes it is even a non-existing url!

2. For one query there can be several ads that leads to the same landing page. It's bad quality. A user wants 9 different ads, not 9 from the same company!

3. Last year came this change: only the highest ranking ad for a given display url will be displayed.
It was very successful at first. But advertisers have learnt to bypass it!

Isn't it time for new rules!? Suggestion:
The Display URL must be the same as the landing page URL.

(Or a shortened form. Like www.widgets.com instead of www.widgets.com/product#*$!#*$!xxx.html)

[arran]

The Display URL must be the same as the landing page URL

It's already the case that the display domain has to be the same as the eventual (i.e. after redirects) landing page domain. It appears the adverts you are seeing have either slipped through the net or are awaiting review (i.e. only showing on google.com).

arran.

[johannes]

From Adwords guidelines:

Your Display URL must accurately reflect the URL of your website

"accurately reflect" is a vague choice of words.

It appears the adverts you are seeing have either slipped through the net or are awaiting review

I've got a few competitors, whose ads have been around for a while. So they must be approved. Most common trick is to use a .com top domain instead of the correct .se domain.

If no one else is seeing this (?), maybe it's just a some ads that "slipped through"?

Is it possible to report advertisers who doesn't follow guidelines?

[DamonHD]

Hi,

Well I appreciate a little bit of wiggle-room from G on the URLs since I direct users to a logical page which has remained constant on my site since 1997 though the final handler has changed more than once. It's my way of keeping URLs stable even when my implementation changes.

The form of the landing page URL I put in the ad also helps me recognise an ad referal even though it is not a dedicated landing page in any way.

Rgds

Damon

[ronmcd]

johannes,
yes you can report advertisers who are breaking the rules, just contact adwords support by email. It often seems widget.net --> widget.com just isnt picked up by the initial review, but adwords will do something about it if you point it out.

From personal experience, to avoid getting your ads shut down you must ensure the display url domain is the same as the final destination domain, although not the same page necessarily. Where I've not done this I've been shut down eventually, even if it took a while. I think the reviewers are maybe just overstretched.

[johannes]

Thanks Ron, I went ahead and reported the most annoying competitor. And the ads were removed within a couple of hours. Adwords support even thanked me for pointing it out!